On the Face of it: Exploring the Interaction Between Racial and Arbitrary Group Recognition

Abstract

The cross-race effect – enhanced recognition of racial ingroup faces – has been justified to exist in other categories, such as arbitrary groups. This study aimed to investigate the effect of crossing racial (black/white) and arbitrary (blue/yellow) categories, in addition to the role of facial expressions in this phenomenon. 120 Caucasian students (from the UK, Macedonia, and Portugal) performed a discrimination task (judging faces as new vs. previously seen). Using a within-subjects design, reaction times and accuracy were measured. We hypothesized that (1) the arbitrary group membership of faces would moderate the cross-race effect and (2) the racial group membership of faces would moderate the usual recognition advantage for happy faces.

Keywords

• arbitrary group, cross-race effect, face recognition, ingroup, minimal group, outgroup, racial group